Wednesday, 28 March 2012
Tuesday, 27 March 2012
Evaluation Activity 1
1In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (i.e. of film openings)
2 - The location or setting of our film is an empty house, which the main character has just moved into. The house is empty and she is clearly on her own. This is a typical storyline in a horror movie, and is also effective as many of the audience are scared of what could frankly, be a reality.
3 - The costumes we used were current and up-to-date in fashion, the film is set in winter, so our main actress 'Aleisha' wore a 'Fair Isle' patterned, knitted jumper and leggings, this is a fairly fashionable outfit, conveying to the audience that the film is set in the current day. Our main actor 'Toby' who played the 'bad guy' on the phone, wore all black, again showing a typical 'baddie'. Costumes are a very common way of showing the audience when the film was made, so again we used a typical 'trademark' of the horror genre.
The props we used we used are extremely typical for the horror genre; a knife, candles, black gloves (worn by Toby). However two of the props we used; the photo's and the photo album are not very typical of the horror genre.
4 - For our camera work and editing, we wanted to use shots that were not necessarily stereotypical of the horror genre, as seen in image 4, we used a low angle close up of aleishas feet, and she runs of camera, creating a low angle long shot. We thought this was effective as it is unusual. (please see 'Analysis of The Rejected' for more in-depth description of our camera work)
5 - The font and size of the writing is also typical for the genre. I chose to use a black background with white writing because this is fairly stereotypical of a horror film, as demonstrated with the image of 'Scream' above.
6 - Our storyline is very typical of the horror genre "innocent teenager, home alone, bad guy on the phone . . . " and the audience learns all of this information with in the first minute and a half of the film. Again, that in itself is a typical trait of our chosen genre, foundation information is delivered basically instantly.
7 - Our title sequence instantly tells the audience what genre the film is. From the outset the film uses low key lighting (candles), knives, surveillance images and other generally creepy items, this connotes to the audience that the genre is horror.
8 - Our characters were introduced in a stereotypical way for our genre, two teenage girls, walk into a mid shot from off screen and walk through a room, while the camera pans to follow them (as described in 'Analysis of The Rejected'). Our other main character, who is the bad guy on the phone is introduced earlier than the two girls, he is the first character that the audience see. This will connote to the audience that although they cannot see his face, they know he will be a very important character in the storyline. The audience can also tell this by the surveillance photos of Aleisha that he has. Toby is also introduced in low-key lighting, which will connote to the audience that he is a very twisted person with a dark personality.
1 - The title of our film is 'The Rejected'. We chose to include the word 'The' as I feel it had more of an effect, it shows the film will be about an individual being rejected, not the word in general. This isn't very typical of a horror movie, as also demonstrated in the 'Scream' image, most horror film titles are general; 'Scream', 'Nightmare on Elm Street', 'Halloween', 'Resident Evil' or 'Paranormal Activity'. All of these names also connote to the audience that something bad happens to more than one person during the film, 'scream', 'nightmare', 'evil', 'paranormal', are all "bad" words, they connote to the audience that the film is a horror before they even viewany footage, be it a trailer, teaser or even the actual film.
3 - The costumes we used were current and up-to-date in fashion, the film is set in winter, so our main actress 'Aleisha' wore a 'Fair Isle' patterned, knitted jumper and leggings, this is a fairly fashionable outfit, conveying to the audience that the film is set in the current day. Our main actor 'Toby' who played the 'bad guy' on the phone, wore all black, again showing a typical 'baddie'. Costumes are a very common way of showing the audience when the film was made, so again we used a typical 'trademark' of the horror genre.
The props we used we used are extremely typical for the horror genre; a knife, candles, black gloves (worn by Toby). However two of the props we used; the photo's and the photo album are not very typical of the horror genre.
4 - For our camera work and editing, we wanted to use shots that were not necessarily stereotypical of the horror genre, as seen in image 4, we used a low angle close up of aleishas feet, and she runs of camera, creating a low angle long shot. We thought this was effective as it is unusual. (please see 'Analysis of The Rejected' for more in-depth description of our camera work)
5 - The font and size of the writing is also typical for the genre. I chose to use a black background with white writing because this is fairly stereotypical of a horror film, as demonstrated with the image of 'Scream' above.
6 - Our storyline is very typical of the horror genre "innocent teenager, home alone, bad guy on the phone . . . " and the audience learns all of this information with in the first minute and a half of the film. Again, that in itself is a typical trait of our chosen genre, foundation information is delivered basically instantly.
7 - Our title sequence instantly tells the audience what genre the film is. From the outset the film uses low key lighting (candles), knives, surveillance images and other generally creepy items, this connotes to the audience that the genre is horror.
8 - Our characters were introduced in a stereotypical way for our genre, two teenage girls, walk into a mid shot from off screen and walk through a room, while the camera pans to follow them (as described in 'Analysis of The Rejected'). Our other main character, who is the bad guy on the phone is introduced earlier than the two girls, he is the first character that the audience see. This will connote to the audience that although they cannot see his face, they know he will be a very important character in the storyline. The audience can also tell this by the surveillance photos of Aleisha that he has. Toby is also introduced in low-key lighting, which will connote to the audience that he is a very twisted person with a dark personality.
9 - I added the special effects during the editing process, I chose certain effects because they looked really cool and have an effect on the audience, especially (see image 9) showing the red filter and flickering effect, because this is a point of view shot, it looks scary. It connotes to the audience that this person obviously has something wrong with them because their vision is distorted. This is fairly stereotypical of the horror genre, as proven by my analysis of 'See No Evil'.
Monday, 26 March 2012
Evaluation Activity 2
2 How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Our main character 'Aleisha' is very similar to 'Sydney Prescott' from 'Scream'. She is a teenage girl, who is home alone, receiving bizarre phone calls from an unknown person, who can see her every move. The girls are clearly both distressed by these phone calls as shown above by the similar body language and facial expression. The main visible difference between the girls is the fashion and hair styles. Scream was released in 1996, 15 years before our film was created. Our main character is also very similar to Sidney because although we only showed the first two minutes of our film, we had a plan for what would happen, and Aleisha is also a character that survives being the main target of a series of murders, like Sydney.
Sunday, 25 March 2012
Saturday, 24 March 2012
Evaluation activity 4
4 Who would be the audience for your media product?
FEMALE -
Like - shopping, pay day!!
Dislike - work, school
Shop - river island, hollister, primark, tesco
Music - classical, R&B, hip hop, holiday
Clothes - fashionable, stylish
Occupation - student, McDonalds, market research assistant
Money - £4.35, £9.30 an hour
Status - middle class
Other films - the polar express, bridesmaids, the hangover
MALE -
Like - food, technology, football
Dislike - work, school
Shop - branded, topshop
Music - hip hop, R&B
Clothes - fashionable, stylish
Occupation - student, shop assistant
Money - £8, £7 an hour
Status - middle class
Other films - cool runnings, the ringer, the hangover
Demographics
Our target audience is males and females aged 15 - 30. Our film is targeted at middle class citizens (E - C2) with an earning of around £5 an hour, or if unemployed an allowance of at least £10 a week. It is a "British film" so our targeted geographical location would be central and eastern England (including major cities such as Birmingham and London).
Psychographics
It is a well known fact that most teenagers love socialising, particularly at the cinema. This is great for film makers with a target audience of teenagers because providing you can get 'word of mouth' about your film, your target audience should watch it at the cinema.
Horror / thriller films such as the 'Scream' series are so effective because they are realistic. There is a very large possibility that their storyline could be a reality, this creates a terrifying atmosphere for the audience, and this is an element we wanted to 'bring to the table' in our film, for our targeted audience.
Research
I gave a group of peopole a questionnaire (asking for yes or no answers, with a section included for comments) ...
1) Do you think that the style of writing (font and colour) are suitable for a horror opening?
2) Did you think that the use of candlelight in the title sequence was appropriate for a horror film?
3) Did you think that the music used was effective (ie. different tracks and the levels of sound)
4) Did you think the music was placed correctly in relation to the action?
5) Do you feel that the range of shots used were effective?
The results I gained included;
1) Yes, the type of font you used is commonly used in horror films
2) Yes
3) Yes, but to improve, could add 'creepy' music to cover silence when she walks up stairs and could be used in the background when she is on the phone.
4) Yes
5) Yes, I really liked that you showed her feet as she ran off and not her body, it had more of an effect.
And as a result of this, I added music into the 'stairs' section, and also when she is on the phone, and I believe that as a result of this my horror opening is creepier and generally more effective.
Friday, 9 March 2012
Saturday, 11 February 2012
Evaluation Activity 6
6 What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
I have gained knowledge of so many different technologies since beginning my A-Level media course. For the creation of my video we used Windows XP computers as opposed to the Apple Macs that were available.
I have gained knowledge of so many different technologies since beginning my A-Level media course. For the creation of my video we used Windows XP computers as opposed to the Apple Macs that were available.
I had little knowledge of how to use the video cameras and now know how to use them effectively. I had never used Adobe photoshop or Adobe premiere pro before.
We have also had to use a program called 'Blogger' which is a website used to post coursework to, I had never used this website before. Once I had started my coursework, I discovered that Blogger also has an 'App' for smart phones, this has helped me greatly in my coursework process, meaning another technology I have used is an 'iPhone 4'.
I used Google as my search engine for my research and planning as opposed to bing or yahoo.
I used YouTube to enable me to do evaluation task 5.
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